


once upon a time

by ScrivenerSavannah



Category: Redwall Series - Brian Jacques
Genre: 5+1 Things, Ensemble Cast, Gen, I have mixed feelings about this one, Other, lots of little pieces, managed to not write an essay on the importance of stories so you should all be proud
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-20
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2019-06-30 00:54:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 4,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15740799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScrivenerSavannah/pseuds/ScrivenerSavannah
Summary: Five things stories give, and one thing they might take. A series of one-shots exploring stories and their importance within the Redwall universe (and hopefully beyond).





	1. Joy

“You’ve got to tell me the story now,” Armel wheedled, pouring Doogy another cup of cordial. “You can’t just tease me like that!”

Doogy could barely drink it for laughing. Tam, blessedly, was across the room, deep in conversation with Jem and utterly incapable of stopping his best friend from spilling whatever tale he pleased.

“Well, now,” Doogy said when he’d regained enough breath for speaking. “The first thing you need to know about the two fussbuckets we served under is that they might be the most empty headed and foolish beasts I have ever had the misfortune of meeting, and that’s me speaking as a relative of Uncle Argus, who was convinced his socks were walkin’ away without him by the time I left home.”

“Were—hahaha, oh me—were they?” Brooky asked, both paws over her mouth in an effort to contain her laughter.

“O’ course not, me babby cousin was taken ‘em for puppets.”

Armel spluttered on her cordial as Brooky let out a great whoop of glee. Loud as her laughter always was, it drew almost no attention with the harvest feast in full swing. Doogy grinned. “So you see the sort o’ foolishness we had to put up with. All ceremony and pomp and nothin’ else. I dinnae know how Tam managed to last seasons without throwin’ ‘em outta the tree.” He took a sizable bite of carrot pasty. “Well, the final straw I’m thinkin’ Tam’s already explained t’ye, how the pair o’ us were tossed into a cell for naught but a few choice words—” Doogy had to pause once again for Brooky’s laughter, this time so hard she had to clutch at her sides.

“A few choice words is one way of putting it, Doogy Plum,” Armel said through her own giggles, trying and failing to sound stern. “Such extreme insults! And after they only wanted you to carry that silly flag in their parade, too.”

“Well, the _real_ insult, as far as Tam was concerned, was the dress outfit they wanted him to wear,” Doogy said with relish. “It was the most revolting, frilly, lacy bit of jumped-up frumpery the pair of us had ever seen. Ribbons, and puffy little sleeves, velvet—”

“What color?” Brooky wheezed.

Doogy took a slow sip of his cordial, milking the revelation for all he could. “Buttercup yellow.”

Armel and Brooky both had to lean into each other, no longer able to sit upright at the image of the forthright and brusque Rakkety Tam in ribbons and bright yellow.


	2. Courage

“Tell me a story.”

The whisper was thin. Mattimeo almost took it for the whispering of the wind through the grass. He couldn’t tell who Tess was speaking to—in the shadows of night, she might have been speaking to the stars. But the stars wouldn’t answer.

“We should be sleeping,” Cynthia whispered, her voice hardly louder. “So we’re not tired tomorrow.”

Mattimeo didn’t move, keeping his eyes on the stars. He could hear the slow, even breathing of their captors, and whimpers of the others, farther away.

“We’re going to be tired tomorrow whether we sleep or not,” Tim whispered. There was the soft clink of chains as someone shifted in sleep.

“Do you remember,” Mattimeo said, “lessons with Abbot Mordalfus? When we were kids?”

Sam scoffed, amusement clear in his voice. “Don’t know how you remember them, Matti. How many times were you told off for daydreaming?”

There were stifled chuckles at this, and even he had to smile, his eyes still on the stars. It wouldn’t make any sense to say there were _more_ stars out here, there were just as many back home. But the woods and the walls of the Abbey made them seem farther away, somehow. Maybe climbing up the cliff had brought them closer, or maybe it was the openness of the plain that made it look as if the sky would swallow them.

“Go on and laugh, Sam. I know I caught you dozing half a dozen times,” he said. “But I was thinking—“

“Oh no,” Tim said.

Mattimeo continued as if he hadn’t heard him, heart already lighter for the casual camaraderie. “—About the day we learned about Marshank.”

“Marshank?” Jube demanded. “What’s Marshank?”

Mattimeo lifted his head and looked first towards the slavers, then around at his friends. The Redwallers were solemn. Auma and Jube, of course, didn’t know the story of Marshank, and he rolled over as much as the chains would allow, dropping his voice. “Have you two heard of Martin the Warrior?”

“No,” Auma said as Jube shook his head.

“Martin was one of the founders of Redwall,” Tess explained quietly. “He was a great warrior, and a great leader, and one of the greatest mice to ever live. He lived a long time ago—ages and ages and seasons ago, and defeated a wildcat to free Mossflower from her tyranny, killing her with a sword forged by the Badger Lord of Salamandastron.”

“Salamandastron,” Auma repeated quietly. “I’ve heard of the place, and the badgers that live there. They’re great warriors, too.”

“He sounds pretty awesome,” Jube agreed. “But what does he have to do with Marshank?”

“Everything,” Mattimeo said. “Because when Martin was young, he was taken by slavers to Marshank, and forced to work, and build.” He took a deep breath, paws clenching so tightly that they trembled and set the chains about his wrists clanking. “He escaped, and more than that he returned with an army and cast the tyrant down.” Mattimeo took a deep breath, shuddering on the inhale. “I’ve been thinking about him a lot, how he must have felt. And I keep thinking—why not us?”

“Because we’re not heroes,” Cynthia said. Her eyes shone wet in the starlight as she teared up. “That was _Martin_ , Mattimeo, of course he escaped. But we’re just—us.”

Mattimeo shook his head. “He wasn’t Martin yet,” he said, trying to put into words the growing certainty he’d had as they’d been marched south. “I mean, he was, because he was who he was going to be, but he wasn’t _yet_. Does that make sense?”

“No,” Tess said. He could practically hear her rolling her eyes.

“No, listen,” Mattimeo said, almost up on his elbows now. “Listen, it’s _important._ He was Martin, but he wasn’t a hero or a warrior or a founder or anything like that. He wasn’t important. He was _just like us._ ”

“I don’t think he was scared,” Cynthia said quietly. “I don’t think Martin could ever be as afraid as I am.”

“All I’m saying,” Mattimeo insisted, “is that—okay, we’re afraid. We’re all afraid!” His voice cracked, and he dropped it again when a nearby rat snuffled in his sleep. “ _I’m afraid_ ,” he said. “I’m afraid my dad is—is _dead_ , and I’m afraid we’re going to be dragged to this Malkariss place, and I’m afraid we’re going to die. I’m not saying we shouldn’t be afraid. I’m saying that—that if Martin could survive and escape and destroy Marshank, and—and be brave? Why can’t we be brave like Martin? Or—” he looked at Cynthia, whose tears had finally spilled over to trace down her cheeks. “Or we could be brave like us. Just—it’s possible. Right?”

There was a moment of deep silence.

“Right,” Auma said firmly. “Right. It’s possible. It’s been done.”

“Right,” Tess agreed. “And—and Mariel. She did it, too! She survived.”

“Timballisto,” Tim reminded them. “He was on the galleys for seasons, and he was from Martin’s clan.”

“And Luke, his father, too,” Sam said. “And Mariel’s dad, the Bellmaker.”

“I hope we do escape,” Jube said. “Because I want to hear all about these beasts.”

Cynthia remained silent, but nodded again and again, scrubbing her eyes with the back of her paw.

Mattimeo was grinning, white teeth almost sharp in the darkness. “Right. So we’ll be brave like all of them, and we’ll be brave like us.”


	3. Comfort

“Tell us a story!”

Cregga couldn’t help but sigh as she picked up the little otter currently doing his best to climb up her back. She put him back on the bed—gently, so much more gently than she could remember being in seasons, even as it slowly became more familiar to her than the scent of iron—and turned her face towards Russano. “Is that what it will take to get you all to sleep?”

There was another far distant rumble of thunder, and the small collection of little ones squeaked. Lev attempted to climb on her back again, and this time she plucked him off and plopped him into her lap, letting him bury his face in her fur.

“It’s only a storm, little ones, and it’s far away and outside, while all of you are in here warm and dry and safe,” she said as patiently as she could. A mousebabe was determinedly burrowing her way under her habit, and the prickles of a hedgehog tickled one of her legs.

“Tell us a story,” Russano repeated, clambering up onto the bed and leaning into her side. “Tell us a story so we won’t think of it.” The rest soon took up the cry.

“Yes, a story!”

“We want a story!”

Cregga shook her head, trying to think. The stories she knew from Salamandastron were definitely not the sorts she’d wish upon any young one, let alone the young ones of such a peaceful, tranquil place as Redwall Abbey. But perhaps… “Well, all right. But you’ve all got to go _right to bed_ afterwards, understand?”

“Yes, Cregga mum!”

“All right, then.” She moved to sit on the floor, careful to nudge some of the slower Dibbuns out of the way. Russano claimed pride of place in her lap, but the rest of them were soon to join him, snuggling into her side or perching on her shoulders. She waited while everyone settled, before asking, “What do you think causes thunder?”

As if on cue, another peal of thunder rumbled through the sky, louder this time as the storm rolled closer.

“A big, smelly rat!” one imaginative hedgehog said. “Walkin’ across the floor!”

“Oh, I don’t think so,” Cregga mused. “He’d have to be very big to make a noise like that, unless he’s falling down the stairs.” Giggles, and she smiled, relaxing back into the bed. “I’ve met rats before, you know, but I’ve never met one big enough to do that. Even if he was falling down the stairs.”

“A woildcat!” an excited mole said. “Those are biggerer, ho aye.”

“Hmmm,” Cregga hummed. “How do you know that? Have you ever seen a wildcat!”

There was a jumbled shout from most of the little ones at this:

“Yes!”

“Of course!”

“The tapestry, the tapestry!”

Cregga shushed them, trying not to smile at their enthusiasm. “All right, yes, I forgot the tapestry. Silly me.”

“But what about the thunder, Cregga Mum?” Russano said, tugging on her sleeve. “I don’t think it’s made by someone falling down the stairs.”

“No, it’s not,” she agreed.

“Then what _does_ make the thunder?” Russano persisted.

Cregga hesitated. She didn’t, after all, know. It had just seemed like a good point to start, and she’d hoped she’d come up with something before much longer. “Well,” she said, stalling for time and casting her mind back to her own youngest days, seasons before she came to Salamandastron, seasons before she learned what it was to hate. “Well, when I was little—” There was a chorus of disbelief at the notion that a beast as large as Cregga could ever have been little. She chuckled. “Of course I was little,” she said. “A long time ago, but I was. Russano is little right now, isn’t he, and he’s a badger like me.”

“Yes,” the mousebabe squeaked from her little makeshift habit den, “But he’s still bigger than any of us!”

Cregga couldn’t help some pride at this pronouncement as she felt the young badger straighten slightly in her lap. Russano would indeed grow to be a true badgerlord. “Yes, but he’s grown from when he first came to the Abbey, as all of you have. As I was saying,” she said, and there was a rustle as the dibbuns quieted again. “When I was very little, my father told me the story of Mellebor, a great badger who roams the Inbetween. He lives in the mists between the world and the Dark Forest, and would patrol the boundaries, preventing any who wished harm to the living from escaping and wreaking havoc.” Cregga stared sightlessly into memory, recalling the image of her father, holding a small, breathless badger upon his knee as a thunderstorm shook their sett. “When we hear the thunder, it is Mellebor growling, scaring away the nightmares and shades and keeping us safe. He has to sound a little scary, so the nightmares know he’s serious, but he wouldn’t ever hurt us.”

Cregga pushed herself to her feet carefully, nudging Dibbuns off and towards their beds as she went, keeping Russano in the crook of her arm.

“D’you think Mellabur gets help sometimes?” Gorse asked. Minding his spikes, Cregga picked him up and put him into one of the beds.

“I’m sure he does,” Cregga said, smiling at the mispronunciation. “There are a lot of heroes in Dark Forest, after all, and I’m sure they sometimes get bored.” There was another crash of thunder, the loudest yet. This time, after the initial startled squeaks, there were giggles and laughter.

“Oi’m thinkin’ th’ skoi-badger agrees wi’ ee, marm,” the mole chuckled.

“Cregga Mum?” Lev asked. “I don’t know if it’s working. I’ve been having nightmares. Could you help Mellamur tonight?”

Cregga put Russano down in his own bed. “I think I could do that, Lev.” She put her paw to the wall and straightened, stalking around the room and growling low and deep in her chest. “Now, you listen, nightmares and shades,” she barked, well aware that the Dibbuns were watching the performance with glee. “You leave my little ones alone, d’ye hear? Or you’ll be dealing with Cregga Rose-eyes! I’ll tear you limb from limb and make you wish you’d never slithered out of the slimy swamp that birthed you! I’ll have your entrails for tea and your toes for supper! So you’d best watch out!”

She reached the door and turned to listen as the Dibbuns settled at last to sleep. Cregga closed the door behind her as she returned to her own room, thinking. There was another crash of thunder, almost on top of the Abbey, and she smiled.


	4. Family

“Father? Tell me a story.”

Joseph didn’t look up from the ropepull he was weaving together for the bell. “I thought you were asleep,” he chided. Mariel shook her head, coming to sit down next to him and lean her head on his shoulder. She’d grown up so much since they’d first set out to deliver the bell to Rawnblade, but sometimes he could see his little girl in the young warrior she had become. Such was fatherhood.

“I can’t sleep with the rain anymore,” she said, watching her father’s paws work the hemp. Her own rope, never far from her even in the cloistered shelter of the Abbey, lay across her lap.

Joseph nodded. The drumming of the rain on the windowpane hadn’t let up for over an hour. He’d wondered how long it would be before Mariel came seeking company. “What story would you like to hear?”

“Tell me how you and mum met.”

“You know it almost as well as I do now,” Joseph chuckled, tilting his head to plant a kiss behind on ear. “Let’s see… How does it start again?”

“Mama was the prettiest mousemaid you’d ever seen.”

“Mama was the prettiest mousemaid I’d ever seen,” Joseph repeated dutifully, unwinding the hemp and beginning again, trying to keep the tension correct this time. “She was wearing bluebells behind her left ear and a smock embroidered with them, too. I’d only moved in with the metalsmith the week before to continue my apprenticeship, and I still didn’t know many of the beasts there, but there was a dance and feast that evening, and I walked into the hall and saw her.”

“And you were too nervous to ask her to dance.”

Joseph smiled at the half asleep tone in his daughter’s voice. “And I was too nervous to ask her to dance. I wasn’t the only one who’d noticed her, either—Azalea never wanted for admirers. She was beautiful, yes, but it was more than that. She burned with life, drew everyone in like a moth to a candle. She came right up to me and said ‘I know who you are, you’re the new ‘prentice for the smith. Are you going to ask me to dance, or do I have to ask you?’ And before I could answer she took my paw and pulled me onto the dance floor.”

Mariel nuzzled into his shoulder, paws clutching loosely at the rope in her lap. “She said she asked because you looked kind.”

“Aye,” Joseph agreed, voice softer. “That she did. She told me I had kind eyes, and steady hands, and that the first time she looked at me she was reminded of a foundation. That I was a mouse she might build a future on.” He tied off the rope and began to coil it. “I fell in love with bells about a season later, and by the time we married, they were calling me the Bellmaker. We left for a while after that, but came back to settle when old Clem was finally making noise about retiring, and when Azalea was pregnant with you.”

He could feel Mariel nod. The drumming of the rain had slackened off to a mere tapping. “Do you think you’ll ever go back to Noonvale?”

Joseph put the rope to one side and wrapped one arm around his daughter’s shoulders.“I doubt it. I’m a bit old for traipsing around the countryside, after all. But maybe you and Dandin will wander up that way one of these days, hm?”

“Maybe,” Mariel agreed.

They sat in silence as Joseph watched the rain running down the dark windowpane, the droplets twinkling in the candlelight like small stars. “She’d be so proud of you, Mariel,” he said at last. “I never saw her back down from anything or anybeast. Ready to spit nails at the idea of the ones she cared about being hurt. You remind me a great deal of her.”

Moonlight slipped through a cloudbreak as Mariel turned her face into her father’s shoulder.


	5. Hope

“Does anyone have a story?”

Silence greeted the request, silence, the clinking of chains, and lapping of the waves against the side of the ship. They were berthed for the moment as the pirates took on supplies—only a brief respite for the galley slaves below. Most of the wretched beasts had put their heads down to rest against the oar they were chained to, taking the opportunity to catch a few moments of blissful, unaware sleep.

Stories had no place in the galleys of the Goreleech. And yet…

“Remember… what apples taste like?” The speaker was a mouse, more recently captured than some of the others. “When I was a mite, that was the first real taste of fall. I remember kicking leaves and munching on an apple, crisp as the frost that’d be coming in a few months.”

“My old mum had the best cordials,” a hedgehog rasped, voice almost gone from lack of water. “She’d only give it to guests, too. We’d bring friends home just to have it at dinner.”

“I used to have a boat,” an otterwife murmured, made old by hardship. “The seawind in my whiskers… I loved the sea. It meant freedom. That’s all gone, down here.”

There was a sniffle from one of the younger mice. “D’you think—d’you think we’ll ever see it again?”

Waves passed under the ship as it rose and fell, creaking with every movement. Slowly, the attention of each beast turned towards the prow of the ship, where a solitary black squirrel sat chained to the oar. Chained opposite her sat a stocky mouse, crouched over his oar. Both beasts were coiled tight with barely contained fury. They were chained, and beaten, and starving like all the rest, and yet…

…And yet…

“Aye,” one of the older mice said, the spark rekindling in his eyes for the first time in seasons, “Aye, I think we will.”


	6. Pain

“I know there’s a story there.”

A log in the fire snapped, sending a shower of sparks swirling into the foggy swamp. Martin blinked, the comment dragging him out of whatever dark thoughts he’d wandered into. Gonff stared at him across the fire, unblinking and unusually solemn.

Nonplussed, Martin stared back. “What?”

Gonff shrugged, prodding the glowing coals with a stick and sending another shower of sparks upwards. Nearby, Log-a-Log snuffled and rolled over in his sleep. “Just… you. In general, I guess. I know you’ve got a story, and I know it ain’t—well, it ain’t a happy one.”

“Why do you say that?”

Gonff snorted. “Martin, mate, that much is as easy to figure out as it is to steal pies from a windowsill. But I’m sayin’ somethin’ now, when I haven’t before because…” he trailed off, eyes narrowed. At last he put the stick to one side and stretched. “Well, I know you hough I was dead goin’ down that waterfall. But I thought the same about all o’ you. I didn’ think I was ever gonna get outta that Screamhole, and I didn’ know if you three had made it safe through the waterfall, or if I was the only one who’d survived.” Gonff shrugged, scratching at one ear. “I was scared. And I guess—well, it made me think. I know ye weren’t tellin’ me the truth back in Kotir. Leastways, not all of it.” He waved a paw when Martin would have protested. “An’ that’s fair. Ye’re private, I respect that. I suppose I just wanted to make sure ye knew… Ye’ve got a story. That’s fine. I don’t need to know it to know I’d follow ye to the end o’ the world an’ back, if that’s where ye decided ye wanted to go.” He grinned, though Martin looked faintly troubled. “I’m followin’ ye to Salmandastron, aren’t I? But ye need to know that, if y’ever need to tell it… I’ll listen.”

“If I ever _need_ to tell it…” Martin repeated quietly. His gaze had returned to the fire, the glow highlighting whispers and reflecting red in his eyes.

“Aye,” Gonff said. “Sometimes a story needs to be told, so it can be put to rest. Goody told me once that some stories are like stones, and that the longer you have t’carry them around, the heavier they can get. Tellin’ ‘em can let ye put it down for a while, even if ye gotta pick it up again later.” Gonff tossed his stick into the fire and stretched again, scratching the back of his neck as he went to lie down. “Anyway, that’s all I wanted to say. I know ye got a story, and I’d like to hear it someday, if you ever want to tell it.”

Martin nodded, mind already wandering back to whatever old paths he’d been wandering down when Gonff first spoke. Gonff wrapped himself in his cloak and put his back to the fire and his face towards the scent of the sea. He’d almost dozed off when Martin spoke again.

“Gonff?”

“Hm?”

“You’re right,” Martin said quietly. “I did lie to you. My father didn’t sail away this past summer, like I implied. He sailed away seasons ago, when I was barely out of infancy.” Gonff lay still, though his ears were pricked and all his attention was on his friend.

“It was the next season that my grandmother and I were captured and marched to the Eastern Sea. She died on the journey, but I—I was forced to help build a fortress, under the tyranny of a stoat named Badrang…”


End file.
